Having been a regular user of the Mantis family of training tools for a little over 2 years now, I thought it was time to take another look at my experience with the system.
The Pink Rhino and Knockoffs
When I first got started with Laser Academy, it was using an official Pink Rhino laser from Mantis. I had zero complaints with it, but when the battery eventually died (roughly 9 months after purchase), I was curious how a knock-off unit would compare. It didn’t take me long on Amazon to find this – a 9mm laser cartridge with spare batteries and caps for only $18!
I was impressed with the build and performance of the knock-off laser immediately. It was just as bright as the official laser, though it seemed to stay illuminated a fraction of a second longer. The battery life also seems to be longer, though I didn’t log how many shots I got in with the first laser bullet. The real difference however came down to how well it stayed in the chamber.
The Pink Rhino has a 2 O-ring design which holds it snugly in your chamber while dry firing. The off-brand one on the other hand only uses one O-ring. This inferior design makes it routinely fall out of the gun when racking the slide.
This can however be a good thing when removing the laser cartridge. Instead of requiring a ram rod to push the Pink Rhino out of the chamber, with the knockoff I can simply rack the slide hard once or twice to dislodge it.
Laser Academy
The laser cartridge may be the heart of the Mantis dry fire system, but Laser Academy is the brain. I love Laser Academy as a way to track your training. On this history tab, it records the data from all your past drills and gives you a graph of the days you met your daily training goal. Keep in mind that the time is kept in Zulu time, so depending on what time you train, it may show missed days even if you practiced that day.
Courses
The courses within Laser Academy are great for novices and advanced shooters alike. They start off at a relaxed pace and focus in on the fundamentals, then drill these until you have them down. I really enjoyed their pistol marksmanship course and am excited to see what other courses they come out with – perhaps for the defensive shooters among us.
Pro Features
I’m too cheap to pay for a Pro account, but some features are pretty tempting. Mainly you get extra drills and thus a way to track more stuff. Of course you can practice whatever using the Open Shooting – Single Target feature on the free version and type whatever notes you want in the description, but it isn’t as native as using the Pro version for things like drawing from the holster.
Mantis X and Blackbeard
I was first introduced to the Mantis family of products through a friend who essentially had the entire line-up, and thus used them all to some extent. But currently I just use the laser cartridge in concert with Laser Academy. Both the Mantis X and Blackbeard are fantastic training tools and I look forward to getting some of my own. But given my limited experience with either product, they will be left out of this review.
Conclusion
If you’ve been on the fence about getting a dry fire aide, look no further than the Mantis family of products, or at least the Laser Academy App. Between an inexpensive laser bullet and the app, you can practice regularly from the comfort of your home and really build proficiency quickly.